A neighborhood in shock: News of tragedy unites a community

Tuesday

Mar 31, 2009 at 12:01 AMMar 31, 2009 at 5:02 AM

Belvoir Road could barely handle two-way traffic Monday, as curious onlookers drove around parked news vans lining the short, normally quiet street. But news of the tragic murder of two sisters by their brother has united the community in shock, grief and even in prayer for the family.

“In such a small town, it seems like everyone wants to drive by and see where it happened,” one neighbor said.

The onlookers came to see the two-story white house at 7 Belvoir Road, the scene of an unthinkable crime Saturday afternoon. Kerby Revelus, 23, stabbed one sister to death and decapitated another, who was celebrating her fifth birthday. Police shot and killed Revelus before he could kill a third sister, 9-year-old Sarafina, who is recovering at Boston Medical Center from stab wounds.

But news of the tragedy has united the community in shock, grief and even in prayer for the parents and the surviving victim.

Milton-related violence

March 28, 2009: Samantha ``Princesse'' Revelus, 17, and her 5-year-old sister, Bianca, are stabbed to death by their 23-year-old brother, Kerby, in their Milton home. Kerby is shot to death by police as he chases and stabs his 9-year-old sister, Sarafina, who survives.
July 26, 2008: Rodney Almond, a 37-year-old father from Milton, and Asa Finley, 26, a father of three from Mattapan, are killed in a drive-by shooting in Milton. The incident is the third drive-by shooting in a month in communities south of Boston.
March 28, 2007: Rico Perry, 19, leads police on a high-speed chase through Quincy and Cohasset and shoots at a state trooper after being stopped in Milton. He is convicted Feb. 20, 2009, of armed assault with intent to murder, auto theft, reckless driving and other charges.
April 2006: Rodrick Taylor, 37, kills Dominique Samuels, 19, formerly of Milton. He is sentenced to life in prison on July 8, 2008.
Oct. 24, 2000: Kevin Bynoe, 15, of Milton and Corey Hinds, 16, of Mattapan are charged with manslaughter and carrying a firearm in the Oct. 24, 2000, shooting death in Milton of Geddes Green, 21, of Dorchester. The men plead guilty and are sentenced in August 2001 to three to five years in state prison.

“I’m just praying right now,” said a woman who identified herself only as Christine R., who lives a few doors down from the Revelus home but didn’t want to use her last name to protect the privacy of her children.

Her youngest daughter usually walks to the Tucker Elementary School around the corner with Sarafina Revelus, and she’s finding it very hard to cope.

“She’s not eating; she’s not sleeping,” Christine R. said of her daughter. “She’s afraid to go to school.”

The playground at the Tucker School is behind the Revelus home. The sound of recess-time laughter at the Tucker School yard, which runs behind Belvoir Road, clashed with the neighborhood scene Monday, when clean-up crews arrived at the crime scene as cold rain fell.

Two vans from Aftermath Inc. out of Easton were parked at the house all day. Outside, five balloons floated above several flower bouquets on the front stairs, left by mourners.

The family gathered at a relative’s house a block away on Brook Road, where a woman at the door said the family wished to grieve in privacy.

Ernst Guerrier, a lawyer and family friend, issued a statement on behalf of the family, thanking the community for the “outpouring of love and support.”

The family’s pain seemed to be felt by residents all over town – from Milton High School students who attended class without 17-year-old Samantha “Princesse” Revelus, a popular senior preparing to graduate, to parents who empathized with the loss of a child.

Mary LeLacheur, who lives just over a mile from the Revelus home, said she cried when she heard the news.

“I cried all day. I asked my husband if he thought I was unusual for that,” she said. “But then I got to the school bus stop this morning and other parents said they did the same thing.”

Such horrific violence is rare in Milton.

Nancy Garcia, who lives around the corner from the Revelus home, recently moved a few miles down Blue Hill Avenue into Milton from Boston. Just crossing the town line made her feel safer, she said.

The glare of police-cruiser lights flashing in her front window was the last thing she expected to see Saturday night.

“It’s just a shock to the neighborhood,” Garcia said. “It was like something out of a movie.”

Nancy Reardon can be reached at nreardon@ledger.com.

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